The Stolen Moment
by BansheeSoprano
Summary: First person takes on Ten and Rose's reunion in The Stolen Earth.


**A/N: I tend to experiment with Ten and Rose, just because I feel there are so many aspects of their relationship to explore. Their reunion in "The Stolen Earth" is probably my favorite moment of the entire TV series, and so I decided to see if I could give it even a little more emotion by looking at it from their points of view. I hope you enjoy.**_  
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_Rose_

I take a deep breath, close my phone, and smile at Donna's family. "Right. I'm gonna find him. Wish me luck."

"Good luck – "

" – good luck, sweetheart – "

Jake locks me onto the signal, and there's a sharp pull at my abdomen, followed by the once-disconcerting feeling of every part of me being pulled apart, then hastily put back together. It's not just the teleport. I'm finally here. I've finally found him. My Doctor, the only man I've ever loved, is just within my reach.

The teleport puts me on a dark, deserted street. Cars are in hectic disarray everywhere, doors flung open, windows smashed. An acrid stench hangs in the air: the smell of humans being struck by the Dalek extermination beams. Everything is deathly silent as a frigid wind blows my hair back from my face. They've ruined my city, my home. They're going to do more if we don't stop them, but that's why I'm here. The Doctor and I have beaten the Daleks before. We'll do it again.

My mind quickly switches gears, though. I look up and down the street – no TARDIS. After a moment's deliberation, and with a hint of irony, I decide to turn left. My heart beats louder in my ears with every step I take, and even my snug blue jacket doesn't stop me from shivering. It's good that my gun has a strap, or I would have dropped it. Breathless would be an understatement right now.

After two blocks, my mouth twists with worry, and I furrow my eyebrows. What if Jake got the coordinates wrong? What if the Doctor and Donna didn't make it after all? What is he's regenerated? What if –

Blue. Bright, royal blue, the bluest blue you've ever seen, and a shock of some really great hair.

He's facing away from me, and I can see that familiar intensity in every bit of his posture. Same old Doctor, hardly able to keep still as he talks to Donna, needing to run off and save the universe _right now_, before he bursts. Donna replies to his queries with a shrug, and then looks past him to see me. Even from my distance, I can see her small smile as she says something else, and he turns to look, too.

I stop dead in my tracks, and even as euphoria overwhelms me, I'm on the edge of tears. All of this time, all of this work, all of this _pain_, and he's right here. He's _standing right there._ I know I'm beaming like an idiot, and I know I have to go see him, to hold him, to know he's real and not just my dreams or even that pathetic hologram, but all I can do is stand there and stare.

He looks like he's in shock, those ridiculous eyebrows bent over his wide eyes, his lips parted. For one paralyzing moment, all my irrational fears consume me – that he's forgotten me, that he doesn't want me – and my feet suddenly move of their own accord, one step, two. Before I know it, I'm running to him, faster than I've ever run before. I can see him running, too, and all my fear vanishes. His face breaks into a smile even wider than mine.

_Here. Now. All of time and space, every galaxy, every universe. Every ounce of heartache. Every rule that kept us apart. Every time I wished I could only see you again. Every time I remembered you saying I couldn't. Everything we were, everything we would have been. None of it matters anymore._

_ We are here. We are now. You are right in front of me, and I am running to you._

_The Doctor_

I step out of the TARDIS to the remains of chaos. The Daleks again, that's their way – inflicting death and destruction until there's nothing left but silent wreckage. Donna follows me, and I can hear her inhale sharply as she looks around. Of course she's shocked; this is her home lying torched around her. I can't help remembering seeing another planet destroyed by the Daleks: fields of red grass charred to black, that same consuming sorrow, only magnified with the thought of _your fault_ . . .

Donna's voice snaps me back to the moment. "Like a ghost town."

"Sarah Jane said they were taking the people," I reply absentmindedly, staring down the street at the abandoned cars. "What for?"

How many have died already? How many more before I stop them? Thousands of questions are running through my mind, and the only one who knows the answers is still nowhere to be found, even now, when I've been given this impossible chance of seeing her again . . .

I turn on Donna in frustration. "_Think_, Donna – when you met Rose in that parallel world, what did she say to you?"

She sighs. She's been through hell these last few hours; I'm asking too much of her, but I have to know. "Just . . . the darkness is coming."

"Anything else?" I press.

She shrugs, and her eyes fix on a point over my right shoulder. To my surprise, the corners of her lips pull up in a small smile. "Why don't you ask her yourself?"

Ask her yourself. Her. No. I can't.

Yes?

I turn around slowly, following Donna's gaze. There's a girl standing there in blue and purple and navy, toting an enormous black gun, but all I can see is pink and yellow, the way I've always thought of her, even after she was gone from me.

She holds herself differently now – maybe it's the gun – but I can still see the girl cowering from shop dummies before I grabbed her hand and told her to run. I can still see the girl with the blazing eyes who absorbed the Time Vortex just to save me. I can still see her laughing, see her cross, see her vulnerable, see her invincible.

I can still see the girl I had to leave forever on a desolate beach, tears coursing down her face as she vanished, right before I could say the words she needed to hear.

I told myself a long time ago that this moment was impossible. I buried those words and tried to go on without her. I tried to accept that I was never going to see her again.

And now Rose Tyler is standing just there, smiling so beautifully, as if nothing – and everything – has happened.

I start walking toward her; she's racing to me. I break into a run, too, and suddenly I'm grinning wide enough to split my face as she gets closer and closer. I knew she was coming, that she was here, but I didn't dare to imagine this, so afraid of having to lose her again. But she found her way back to me.

"_And I suppose, if it's my last chance to say it – Rose Tyler – "_

I'll say it this time. I'll say it a thousand times. I'll say it until she hates hearing it; I'll say it until my two hearts stop beating for good. She deserves no less.

She's so close now. I can see the tears glistening in her beautiful brown eyes.

_I love you. I love you. I love you._

__**A/N: Did it work? I'd love it if you'd leave a review and tell me. :) It is my immutable belief that Ten would have told Rose he loved her if all that business hadn't occurred with TenToo, thus the inclusion of the ending.  
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